


and it would all come down to this (three points where two lines met)

by oximore



Category: The Magicians (TV)
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Depression, F/M, M/M, Season/Series 01 Spoilers, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, Spoilers, communications issues like wow, huge amount of Quentin+Julia brotp feels, not really poly but almost/sorta halfway there maybe, playing around with the trope, some low-key on the side "blink you will miss it" Penny and Q brotp, soulmarks AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-29
Updated: 2016-04-29
Packaged: 2018-06-05 04:21:32
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 15,331
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6688963
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/oximore/pseuds/oximore
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Soulmarks AU where the first words the one you're soulbonded to are written on your skin.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. I can mix miracles (but matters of the heart are a shot in the dark)

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into Русский available: [и все ведет к этому (три точки, где пересекаются две линии)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/13215756) by [shenanigans_d](https://archiveofourown.org/users/shenanigans_d/pseuds/shenanigans_d)



> Major thx to moregeous-kieren for the beta reading - this was an even bigger mess before that let's face it.  
> (English isn't our first language so be warned I guess? I will try to polish this as much as I can little by little & I think it's reasonably correct right now?)

#

 

Eliot was a child when his soulmark appeared.

He remembered the wonder he felt when it happened, watching words emerged, circling around his right elbow like a ribbon. Or a like a snake, coiled around his skin. His parents weren't marked. It was not something rare or strange, marked people were usually somewhere between thirty-six and forty-five percent of the worldwide population in the last decades. In the past, over seventy percent of the world population carried a soulmark, but the rate had been going down over the last century, though no one knew how to explain it.

Eliot hadn’t known what it was when it appeared but he just found it beautiful. And even though the joy he felt that day did not last, he still cherished the memory.

Growing up somewhat drained the wonder. It was not like there was one precise moment when things stumbled and went down, it had been a muddier process. Being a gay kid in a small farmer town in Indiana didn’t help - even if he wasn't "out", he was always different, always feeling in the wrong place. He knew he didn’t belong there. People in town knew it too – they could feel it - even his own parents. When a few years later a bus killed Logan Kinear, he wondered why even an incredible thing like telekinesis had to be tainted too.

If Eliot was honest, he had stopped being amazed by the words on his skin about as soon as he could read them.

His soulmark disappointed him. On his good days he thought the words were just nothing special and on his worst days, when he felt like being cruel, he told himself that whoever his soulbound was seemed barely literate. Eliot had wished for his mark to be _more_ , more special, more refined, more _anything_ but what it was. The words were what they were unfortunately, nothing more, nothing less. They were random, confused, and utterly unremarkable.

In time, that’s how Eliot started to think about whomever he was bound to.

 

#

 

In Brakebills Eliot grew more in control. His confidence flourished.

He carefully crafted himself into who he wanted to be, or as close as he could get, and the closer he got, the more restless he grew. Most of the students here had soulmarks – higher percentage of soulmarks appeared on magicians – and plenty seemed to just find each other easily. No one spoke his words and he told himself he wasn’t waiting for them.

Eliot knew perfectly well that whoever he was bound to was younger – the mark had appeared the day they were born after all – but the gap between them wasn’t that big, some part of him at least had hoped they would meet here. He heard approximations of the words often enough, but never exactly the right ones. Never felt anything close to a soulbond or any kind of sensations he knew was supposed to get when the words were said or when he touched them though.

He did not let that stop him from trying to enjoy himself whenever he could but he felt the need to cover the mark up each time someone would look. He laughed at the idea that he cared time and time again, until it almost became the truth. Still he couldn’t help but wonder, _what if he isn’t a magician? What then?_ Selfishly enough, as prominent as the part of him who looked down on his soulmark became, he couldn’t imagine being soulbounded to someone without magic. He wondered if that made him more of a jerk or if it was just natural.

When he met Margo, neither of them spoke of soulmarks until the trials. And after their trial, she gave him a spell that could easily glamour his mark without saying anything, she just gave him the spell and there was no judgment in her eyes.

Eliot hadn’t felt that grateful toward someone in his entire life.

 

#

 

"What if it was a woman?" Margo asked him once.

Eliot couldn’t quite remember when, probably very early in the morning - both of them were delightfully drunk at the time. How long it took him to answer could have been blamed on the alcohol, though they both knew it wasn’t the sole reason.

" _Why_ would it be a woman?" he finally muttered with a frown.

"I don't know?" she said, shrugging with a surprising amount of grace for someone as close to being plastered as she was, "it's just, soulmarks aren't _always_ romantic I guess? And as long as it’s not an active bond you can’t really know right?"

She was right of course, yet something about his soulmark being a woman didn’t sit right with Eliot. He had always thought about the words on his skin as coming from a man, a gut feeling maybe, something he couldn’t explain. Or maybe as jaded as he thought he was about it all, about marks in general, a part of him he thought buried still expected to fall in love with his soulbound.

He wondered if you could be half in love with someone’s words. Then he scowled - it sounded stupid, even in his head – and yet... Maybe you could love and hate your mark at the same time? Gosh, he was so drunk.

"Well if you go that way Bambi, sometimes soulmarks aren’t even mutual." Eliot told her, taking another sip of wine. “You can have the mark from someone who literally touches your soul and you don’t get to touch them back the same way. So beautifully ironic isn’t it?” he finished, aiming to sound as perfunctory as possible.

From the look Margo sent his way, he had failed pretty badly on that – or she could see through it by now, which was entirely possible and vaguely unnerving.

"Ugh," Margo sighed patting his leg, “now you’re just being bleak sweetie.”

Eliot never told her that if his soulbond had been a woman, he would have expected it to be her. Part of him hoped she knew.

 

#

 

The only thing that went through his mind when it happened, ironically, was just as trite as he always thought his soulmark was: _“This cannot be happening.”_

Eliot had been sent on this errant grudgingly - he was not in a position to say no, the request coming directly from Henry Fogg. And Eliot cared very much about the Dean with all the rest of the authority here in Brakebills to keep on willfully ignoring the parties they had going on in the physical kids house.

He didn’t know nor did he care why the Dean wanted him to get this particular newbie himself, he just waited where he was supposed to, enjoying a smoke. It’s only when said guy stood in front of him, and begun to babble confusedly Eliot started to _listen_. The newbie – _Quentin_ , or so the paper in his pocket said - was looking around like he was waiting to wake up any seconds. It wasn’t an unusual reaction to those who wandered into Brakebills for the first time but it was certainly entertaining to witness.

“Quentin Coldwater?” he asked. And frowned slightly because seriously how was _that_ a real name?

Except, apparently it was real enough, since Quentin gave him a vague “uh uh” of approbation in response. Eliot jumped on the grass.

“I’m Eliot.” he said and allowed himself to _look_ – because why not? “You’re late.”

Quentin was small, nerdish in a way that was really not supposed to be charming, and clearly utterly lost. The first word in Eliot’s mind was _cute_.

He started to walk away without really listening to Quentin behind him, apparently trying to figure out actual words - they had places to go. “Where am I?” Quentin managed at the end of what was possibly meant to be a sentence he finished babbling spasmodically.

That was when Eliot felt it.

It wasn’t something cosmic at all, no the way some people made it sound like. It felt more like a quiet ripple in a pool, awareness. Like meeting someone for the first time and then _“oh, here you are, I forgot that I was hoping for you”_. For someone who had thought about it as often as he did, Eliot had surprisingly no idea what he was supposed to do with that. Especially when the other part didn’t seem to notice _anything_. The tip of his finger tingled and he felt glad for the cigarette in his hands, something to busy them with. He answered as casually as he could because this couldn’t be happening.

But it had, he realized.

This newbie had just said the exact words written on Eliot skin, down to the each precise ridiculous onomatopoeia before ending on that question he read hundred before and Eliot didn’t mind their clumsiness all that much anymore. Quentin was clearly too astonished by everything to notice something, clearly not over it if they fact that he asked Eliot if he was _hallucinating_ was any indication. Quentin was also _late_.

Eliot led him to the exam room, as he was supposed to, telling himself _“later, later, later”_ before pushing him inside hoping he wouldn’t flunk. Nothing more he could do now.

He had to find Margo.

 

#

 

“Found him.” He said as he entered Margo’s room with no warning and Margo looked away from her book entirely focused on Eliot in a matter of seconds. His left hand went to his right elbow without thinking, where his mark was under the clothes and the glamour.

Margo’s eyes followed the movement. “Him, _him_?” she asked, something in her voice he couldn’t quite identify. He chose not to.

Eliot nodded.

“Yes. Positively ridiculous, weirdly cute, taking the entrance exam right now. ”

He tried to light another cigarette, just to make his hands stop touching his own mark. Going for casual with your hands shaking, it turned out, wasn’t easy.

“Ok”, she said taking his hands in hers, “Tell me _everything_.”

 

#

 

Eliot waited for Quentin to say something with a curious form of anticipation mixed with self-contempt, mocking himself for feeling even the smallest spark of interest. They whisked Quentin away, because Margo had to see him and Eliot needed to check that he hadn’t imagined the entire thing in a particularly bizarre self-pitying delusion.

He hadn’t, the soulbond pulsating under his skin getting stronger each time he was around Quentin all the proof he needed. But nothing happened.

Well, Quentin did talk, and was just as much as a nerd as Eliot assumed - if not more - but he certainly didn’t mentioned a soulmark, or feeling an out of nowhere soulbond. He didn’t seem to react differently around Eliot – too busy being amazed by Brakebills and by magic with a practically childish wonder that Eliot would openly mock if a small part of him didn’t envy it as well. There wasn’t even the tiniest hint that he had a soulmark reaction. Eliot swallowed back the bitter laugh that almost passed his lips. Clearly Quentin didn’t feel any of what Eliot was stuck feeling.

The soulbond felt brilliantly new. It was so unlike anything he’d known before that it was all Eliot could think about at times. How much he felt it seemed strange at the beginning, but was apparently perfectly regular. Eliot had to get used to the distraction it brought. It was in the first few days, to the point were it affected his magic too. He hadn’t lost control of his telekinesis in years but it started to happen again for a while - nothing dangerous thankfully but still noticeable. The only reason he didn’t feel too concerned was that things seemed to settle fast enough. But it was impossible to ignore the soulbond, always there on the edge of his consciousness.

Quentin however seemed concerned by everything _but_ that.

 

#

 

“Why won’t you just _ask_ him?” Margo asked sensibly after getting back from the rather depressing birthday party of Quentin’s friend. “Instead of just assuming that this is a one-way soulmark, because he didn’t say anything while you said nothing at all yourself?”

“I don’t really see the point, Margo.” He said, aiming to sound bored but aware that it was rather defeated.

“What do you mean _“you don’t see the point”_ , isn’t it obvious?” she argued. “That would in fact be the most logical thing to do Eliot. I mean you thought your own words were too random but his? Your first words to him were literally just his name! You said so yourself: how much more random can you get? And no, don’t say “Hi!” or Hello!” because I know you know it was purely rhetorical.”

Eliot sniggered.

“Look, I _felt_ it ok. Maybe not in the whole exaggerated way some movies like to use but still, I felt _him_. I think it should have been obvious for him too if it went both ways. Figures it wouldn’t really.”

It was Margo’s turn to sneer.

“Yes, because _that_ would be the first thing he would focus on at the moment _magic_ becomes real in his life. Obviously.” She said, her tone full of irony, before her voice slightly softened. “You should just _ask_ Eliot. The boy is a walking mess but I don’t think he would be an asshole about soulmarks, even if the mark is a one-way bond like you decided to think it is. And if he _is_ a shit about it I’ll destroy him ok?”

Eliot sighed. “No.”

“So what? You’re just going to keep him around and say nothing at all?”

“Well, he does make a rather cute puppy – albeit a bit shabby.”

He ignored the pointed look Margo gave him and was almost glad for the interruption when they heard about the attack, until they learned it was Quentin’s class.

 

#

 

“I bond fast.” Eliot said swallowing down the irony because it wasn’t true, and yet he was being entirely truthful right now.

He wished he wasn’t as sincere as he was, he wished he could be joking and acting as casual as ever. Quentin was right, they didn’t know each other at all yet Eliot felt like they did. As much as he wished he didn’t he _cared_ about Quentin being expelled he did care enough to try to say something semi positive that probably felt completely flat.

It didn’t help Quentin’s mood at all. Then again, Eliot hadn’t really expected it to.

 

#

 

Things calmed down a bit after the whole “summoning disaster and a murderous beast from another world” affair was thrown under the rug one way or another. Quentin was still here, not expelled in the end, not kicked out back in the grey world. Not alone and lonely and maybe in a position to so see Eliot as something worth having.

Eliot chuckled. That was one Hell of a shitty thing to fantasize about.

 

#

 

They became friends with an ease that Quentin never really seemed to question and that Eliot never failed to find bittersweet.

Eliot and Margo had been a duo for so long that new people entering their dynamic had always felt off, and never lasted long. With Quentin, Eliot didn’t have to even try, he just fit with them and as much as Margo liked to pick on him, Eliot knew she didn’t really mind Quentin. Knowing her, she was probably wondering why herself. Quentin handled sarcasm as well as they did and was enough of a little shit around the edges to not get completely overpowered by either of them. He was a convoluted mix of self-doubt, low self-esteem and arrogance, with what was likely chronic depression, and still could find more beauty and genuine awe in magic than Eliot ever remembered feeling. Eliot wondered what it said about him.

Still, he thought everything was fine. They were finding a balance of sort.

One-sided soulmarks weren’t the end of the world – and it was not like Eliot found himself in short supply of cute boys. As Margo had said, Quentin wasn’t even that cute. Plenty of people had one-sided bonds - it wasn’t bad like a rejected soulmark. Eliot was fine with it – as he told Margo more than once - and he really was. It wasn’t painful, being around Q. Once he grew more used to it, the bond even felt good.

Eliot was as ok, as ok as he had ever been, even if he did keep on noticing tiny useless things. The way Quentin smiled at him, the way his hair was a mess more often than not, the way he would hide his face behind it sometimes or how he almost never sat in chairs without crouching. Things that made him tense, things that made him laugh. It didn’t really have to mean anything.

Then one afternoon, Quentin pushed his hair away from his face, annoyed by the heat in the room as Eliot was making cocktails. He gathered them into something vaguely resembling a bun – except not really because Quentin’s hair wasn’t long enough for that yet - and Eliot saw it, on the side of his neck near the back, under his left ear, just a bit lower. It was small and insignificant looking but it took his breath away because this was _his_.

 _“Quentin Coldwater?”_ was written neatly on Quentin skin in his own handwriting. Eliot couldn’t tear his eyes away from it, couldn’t focus on anything else. He must have been silent too long, or not answer to something because Quentin looked up at him questioningly.

“Something wrong?” he asked, his face scrunching up the way it did when he was confused and the familiarity of it was suddenly too much for Eliot.

He couldn’t even remember what he said before leaving the room as fast as he could without looking like he was running away.

 

#

 

He didn’t tell Margo about the mark.

It would involve dealing with the fact that maybe he wasn’t as fine as previously assumed about the whole soulmark situation. So he didn’t mention it, and couldn’t quite deal with it either. He knew what Margo would do, she would go and confront Q about it and Eliot just _couldn’t_.

He could, however, obsess about it and so he did. His eyes too often went to Quentin’s neck now that he knew that it was there, waiting for a glimpse of it. At times Eliot almost ached with the need to touch it, to see his handwriting on Quentin again and it was a tricky exercise in denial not to think about how embarrassingly hard the tiniest sight of his mark on Q’s neck made him.

He made himself remember how Quentin didn’t seem to react to the mark at all, how he didn’t notice Eliot saying his words or that their soulbond was active. There could be plenty of reasons why – Eliot had looked it up, had spent actual time researching it goddamn it – but he was mostly left more unsure.

 

#

 

Margo didn’t mind Quentin, but she seemed to _like_ Alice, in that strange way of hers. She kept on pushing, and pushing, clearly hoping for the girl to bite back. But Alice mostly looked somewhere between puzzled and distrustful, which was both entertaining to watch and a bit depressing considering how Alice also seemed to gravitate towards Quentin as if he somehow felt safer.

 

#

 

Margo surprisingly, _really_ didn’t like Mike.

“I’m really not sure you know what you’re doing,” she said still looking a bit bitter but calmer now, “and it’s not just about you making me go alone on what is supposed to be our holiday. This is just a really stupid idea and not one of your usual ones.”

Generally, Margo tolerated Eliot’s boys just fine – with exceptions here and there - she rarely ever had such a strong dislike towards one of them before. Eliot wondered if she was just being selfish, wanting them to go together and spiteful toward Mike because he was coming between them, or if it was because he still hadn’t talked to Quentin. He wasn’t sure. Maybe she was being possessive, or she was really concerned. Not that it really mattered, Mike was here, he was attractive, he clearly wasn’t seeing Eliot only in a friendly manner and they were highly compatible. This was all he needed right now.

“It doesn’t feel like a stupid idea.” He told her.

“Darling, that is exactly my point.” She said with a smile. It didn’t really reach her eyes.

 

#

 

When Quentin came back from Brakebills South – and of course he did, Eliot knew he would – it was so painfully obvious that something had happened between him and Alice that Eliot almost felt bad for the awkwardness between them. Almost. Then pettiness kicked in and he would thrive on things being awkward, viciously wondering if Alice had seen the mark on Q’s neck, before feeling mostly guilty about it. He was supposed to be Quentin’s friend and this wasn’t what friends did. It wasn’t even jealousy, or not only that, more like disappointment, mostly toward himself for still expecting something that was clearly not going to happen.

It was unfair for all of them really. For Quentin who had apparently no idea, for Alice who clearly had enough on her plate, and for Mike who was so far a delightful boyfriend, if Eliot dared to call him that. Which he didn’t – there weren’t there yet and he wasn’t sure they would be. It was even unfair for himself, a voice that sounded awfully like Margo said in the back of his head. He deserved better than that too.

But Margo wasn’t here, and Eliot felt a bit scattered, both around Mike and around Quentin. “Nothing good is going to come from you not talking about it with him” Margo had said to him before leaving, and it suddenly felt like maybe Eliot should have listened.

“He is pretty.” Mike said. There was no judgment in his voice, only something like mild contemplation.

“I know,” Eliot let out with a smile, “but I called dibs on him.”

He wasn’t kidding as much as he wished he was about that.

 

#

 

The worst thing, afterward, standing still in this hallway, wasn’t the coppery smell of blood heavy in the air, but the silence, barely broken by the ragged sound of the Dean’s breathing.

Dimly, Eliot thought he should check on him but he couldn’t even move one foot away from were he was. Mike’s body looked _wrong_ on the floor, the posture unnatural and so, so still. He couldn’t bring himself to stop looking at it. He had done that. He had been looking forward a date and look where he was now, in a hallway with a dead body, another one in the room a bit further.

The familiar pulse of the bond in his veins didn’t make him feel any less alone.

 

#

 

He strategically avoided thinking about it.

About Mike, about Mike being possessed by the Beast, about him trying to kill Quentin, about how long he had been possessed, about how much of Mike it had ever been at all. He couldn’t think about that without feeling nauseous, on the verge of throwing up and utterly pitiful. So he didn’t. Or at least tried very hard not to. The same way he didn’t think about Alice and Quentin’s awkwardness around each other, or about the timid concerned gaze both of them would send his way. He didn’t think about it because he was beautifully numb and thankfully too drunk to care about it anymore.

Except that Quentin looked… he looked shaken in that distant way of his.

After the whole “turned out your favorite books were written by a pedophile and his sister was torturing and killing children” he guessed it made sense. Some part of Eliot almost wished he could help, but he wasn’t in any state for that. So he kept on looking and did nothing. What could he have said anyway? _“Sorry about this. I know my sorta boyfriend tried to kill you while being possessed and that he killed that woman who was apparently helping you? Would have really sucked if he killed you considering you’re my soulmate right? And now that we are out of that freak house this all seems to be getting worse with Penny just vanishing with that stupid button so maybe we could make out? ”_

As if it could make things much better at this point.

 

#

 

Margo came back and Eliot almost wished she didn’t, because she knew him too well. She would push where Quentin or Alice never dared to. He didn’t want to talk. He just wanted to forget about everything for a while and pretend like everything he had crafted himself to be hadn’t turned out as much a mess as what he was before.

 

#

 

What Eliot didn’t expect was Quentin cornering him.

“We really need to talk.” He said. Eliot tried to open his mouth but Quentin was quicker and didn’t give him the time to speak. “And no I’m not listening to anything you could say to distract me with before we sit down somewhere private and actually _talk_. ”

“Did Margo put you up for this?”

Quentin frowned.

“What? No. Why would she even… Wait – does that means she knows about the mark?”

Eliot abruptly felt like he couldn’t breathe.

“You _knew_?” he asked, hating how strangled it sounded.

“I didn’t!” Quentin spluttered before grabbing Eliot’s hand and dragging him to his room, not letting go even after the door closed behind them. They stood there awkwardly, Eliot looking between their hands and Quentin, trying to prepare himself for a talk he knew they should have had months ago. Trying and failing, if the strong urge to either escape or pass out was any indication. He wished his heart would stop beating so stupidly loud in his ears.

“Uh, so, I... ok this isn’t really how I was planning to do this but… then again I wasn’t really planning to have this talk – except Alice really thinks we should and she is probably right on that one and…”

“Q…”

“No!” Quentin interrupted. “I have to say this…Uh, so, I was trying to…” Quentin eloquently continued, finally letting Eliot’s hand go to make vague gesture in direction of his neck without actually looking at Eliot, “I think I may have your…”

“You do.” Eliot said, noticing that his voice sounded calmer than he felt - if a bit tight. He felt like he had lead weight in his guts, so calm was impressive as far as he was concerned.

Quentin finally looked up at him.

“I saw it.” Eliot explained.

“Why didn’t you say anything?” Quentin asked, voice rising a bit.

Eliot shrugged carefully without taking his eyes of Quentin. “Why didn’t you?”

Quentin avoided his eye again.

“I didn’t notice it until recently.” He muttered.

“You didn’t notice.” Eliot said flatly. He hoped Quentin wasn’t planning on leaving it at that because Eliot would probably tie him to the bed until he had answers at this point. And ok that was not supposed to sound as tempting as it did.

“I… you… there was Brakebills and magic was real and…”

“I’m not wondering about that moment Q. I can understand why you didn’t notice then. I’m having a harder time understand how it was possible I spent days trying to get used to the constant presence of an active soulbond while you seemed oblivious to it.”

“I guess it’s because I didn’t have to get used to it.” Quentin replied without looking at Eliot. “Because I already knew what it felt like, the active soulbond. I was already used to it.”

Eliot guts twisted unpleasantly. He was pretty sure he understood what Quentin was trying to say but nearly wished he didn’t.

“You already had an active soulbond.” He whispered.

Quentin nodded. “Yeah – and my brain is kind of a mess ok so I didn’t… I didn’t realize it wasn’t only one soulbond I was feeling anymore. Sure things felt off and weird sometime but it’s nothing rare for me so I just… I didn’t get it.”

Eliot didn’t know what to say. He knew people could have more than one soulmark – he knew plenty of people with more than one soulmarks here in Brakebills and yet he just… He wanted to ask who and when and how and something sour spreading in the back of his mouth that was probably jealousy. He swallowed it down, tried to ignore it.

“Any idea on what you want to do about it?” he said, hoping he didn’t sound as bitter as he felt.

The look on Q’s face told him he hadn’t think that far.

 

#

 

“It’s not, it’s not, we’re not romantic, my other soulbond.” Quentin said feebly. “I though it was – but it wasn’t in the end – it’s… it’s pretty confusing you know, it’s not like you get a sign.”

Eliot stayed silent. He was pretty sure this soulbond of his _was_ romantic as much as he’d like to believe it wasn’t and he didn’t feel confused about it as much as disenchanted. Then again, he only had one.

 

#

 

When Quentin told him how he finally realized they were soulbonded, Eliot laughed so hard he brought himself to tears.

 

#

 

“I cannot believe it took Mayakovsky for you to realize we were soulbonded.” Eliot said evenly, his emotions safely locked away in tiny bottle. It seemed easier to say – which was probably precisely because emotions weren’t really a problem anymore.

“I can.” Penny muttered, looking more bored than surprised by the whole thing.

“Well I can’t believe you thought _“never ever talking about it”_ was a valid course of action so I guess we can both be amazed at each other stupidity.” Quentin replied flatly.

“You are both so bad at this.” Alice remarked calmly as she put the red bottle around her neck. “It’s actually quite impressive.”

“They are.” Margo said with a nod. “Then again, your boy did managed to miss his soulmark entirely – that’s in itself is a feat.”

“He is not my boy.” Alice told her with a tiny frown on her face and Margo shrugged.

“Shouldn’t we be training?” Eliot asked pointedly.

Penny left the room with a groan.

 

#

 

Quentin kissed him in a corridor as they were trying to reach their room – just to lay down five minutes because battle magic was positively exhausting - and Eliot had to admit he hadn’t seen that one coming.

It was barely a kiss, more like Q’s lips touching his lightly while on his tiptoes, hands in his vest dragging him down. Almost chaste, but still more than enough for Eliot to suddenly feel wide-awake and _hungry_. His hands went for Quentin’s neck and waist, as Quentin was about to pull away, bringing him back right where Eliot needed him, locking their mouths together. Quentin gasped, opening his mouth and Eliot went for it. Their kiss was more messy than good this time, though Eliot couldn’t bring himself to care, only wanting more, and more, and more. It didn’t matter right now if Quentin was going to regret it later, not when it felt so good to finally get it.

They were all sort off high, Eliot knew that – swallowing their emotions back repeatedly was possibly the worst kind of rush he had ever experienced - but even if he had been able to, Eliot wasn’t noble enough to say no. Not when he apparently wanted it more than he had ever allowed himself to realize.

He pushed Q against the wall, harder than he intended to, vaguely aware that he was absolutely graceless in this, and swallowed the sound coming from Quentin’s mouth into his own. Quentin surprised him again when he pushed him away, not to stop but instead to push both of them inside Eliot’s room until they fell on the bed. This was probably a terrible idea, but as Quentin straddled him and leaned down to kiss him again Eliot couldn’t bother to remember why.

 

#

 

Somewhere in the back of his mind Eliot was surprised by the lack of awkwardness.

They were both quite a mess, yet everything seemed easy. Not the way he had expected it to be. He had expected Quentin to freak out mid-way when he would realize that Eliot had a dick but the moment never came. Instead Quentin amazed him by being so responsive – he was surprised to realize how much of a very unexpected turn-on it was for Eliot. There was something exhilarating in that, in seeing Quentin react so well to each kiss, each touch, not wincing or recoiling the way some straight guys he slept with tended to do when Eliot tried to guide him. It turned their messy rushed sex into what was ironically one of the hottest experiences in Eliot’s life. He was attentive, curious, even a little bit forceful at times and definitely a fast learner, to Eliot’s gratification really. Plenty good with his hands, which turned out to be Eliot’s downfall, making him come hard on his fingers before Eliot managed to get Quentin to fuck him. He couldn’t manage to feel more than distantly disappointed about it as the both drifted to sleep.

 

#

 

Quentin was gone in the morning and Eliot almost wished he was surprised.

 

#

 

Quentin as it turned out, _really_ was bit of a loser. And put avoidance as a way to deal on a whole new level even for him which, Eliot had to admit, was impressive.

But he came back and tried to apologize – that ended up being embarrassing for both of them once they actually got to the talking part - the sex part before kind of made it all worth it though. The thrill Eliot felt low in his gut each time he saw the imprint of his teeth on Quentin’s neck afterward was certainly worth it if he had anything to say about it. Possibly a bit problematic if the way it kept on making his dick twitch with interest didn’t eventually stop.

He likely owed Margo a fruit basket – and Alice, with whom he may or may not have been sharing Quentin - he didn’t know just yet how he felt about that but it could wait. Then again, Quentin looked pretty unsure too. Eliot may even owe something to Penny but - no he really wasn’t going to try touching that one.

So maybe Quentin was a bit of a loser who freaked out a lot. Then again, Eliot hadn’t been much better at dealing with everything so he guessed maybe they should just give each other a pass.

 

#

 

Thing was, Eliot never expected to be so _hungry_. After their first time and their rocky second, it was like he’d opened some unknown doors to his own well locked up wants and he couldn’t seem to close them again. That was probably why they ended up making out rather heavily in the kitchen despite Quentin’s initial reluctance because “Anyone could just walk in Eliot!” As if it was the kind of thing that worried him. Not like Quentin’s hesitation had lasted long.

At some point Eliot lifted Quentin up on the counter – easier access really – laughing softly when Quentin voiced his disapproval at being manhandled. “I know I’m small you ass” he muttered but still used the opportunity to bring Eliot’s face back in a kiss. "Oh?" and really Eliot had to, how could he resist? "Are you really?" he asked one hand going to Quentin's crotch. Quentin elbowed him, but not without a groan, hips bucking into Eliot’s hand. He wasn't surprised when Quentin bit his lower lip - marvelously too rough the way he tended to be. It was something he did more and more often and Eliot thought Quentin's excuse of getting back at him for the still healing bite on his neck was wearing thin. Quentin just enjoyed biting him. Not that Eliot was complaining but it had a way of making him wish he could have them both naked already, being in the kitchen be damned.

Eliot distantly wondered if it still counted as making out if he was to put his hand down Quentin’s pants, not really caring about the answer before one of his hands went down to play with the rim of his jeans. The sudden need to get Quentin's pants open and put his mouth on him made the idea look like a good one - well not really good - but it certainly made him not care about it being a bad one. He was already working the buttons open when a familiar voice put a stop to his work.

“Not that I mind the show, but you do know you’re not the only two people living here right?”

Eliot felt Quentin freeze and sighed.

“Bambi I love you but this is really not a good time." he told her with a glance, very aware of how low his voice was.

Margo made a falsely wounded face before giving a pointed look to Quentin who was busy hiding his face behind his hair and looking at the ground. He was probably going to have some minor freak out about this later. There went the chance of getting him into a bit of public indecency.

"But you're right baby, that is really not a good time - especially with you thinking doing it in the kitchen where we all eat is a good idea. Even less when you know that the rest of the second years are probably going to crash home any minutes now."

"Shit." Quentin whispered somewhere near Eliot's neck.

 

#

 

"Should we talk about it?" Alice asked him after what felt like one too many rounds of "let's swallow back our emotions and feel like dying".

Quentin disappeared somewhere, the way he usually did after getting everything back – it was getting worse for all of them and he had no idea how he could help when his current method was to drink steadily higher levels of alcohol. He was not really surprised that Alice finally came to him. He had hoped she would let it go until, well, until a hypothetical day if they survived the trip to Fillory.

Of course she wouldn't though - she liked to analyze problems from every angle before going after them, and she wasn't the postponing kind.

"Do we have to?" he tried - it was worth a shot - even if he knew it wasn't going to work.

"Yes." she said with that underlying iron in her voice that Margo seemed to love about her. Well one of the things actually, the list was longer than Bambi liked to admit.

He wondered about it sometimes, but wasn't really in a position to ask. He sighed and crushed his cigarette on the stone before taking a quick sip of his flask.

"So..." he started.

"I like Q." she said bluntly, twisting her hands in the front of her dress. It was actually quite cute - and brave in a way Eliot only wished he was.

"Well, talk about one Hell of an opening." he muttered. "Ok then – good I guess?"

Alice’s raised eyebrows were quite explicit – had she been spending more time with Penny? Because she was giving him _the_ look – the one Penny could have patented at this point.

"Fine. Let's just go for it and get things out on the open yes if that’s what you want: I like Q too. Amazingly enough he doesn't seem to mind some of the ways in which I like him that I expected him not to like."

He saw something pass over her face, too quick for him to catch but he knew enough about wearing an armor to guess that she wasn't necessarily as serene about the talk than he first thought.

"I'm not the one on his ribs." she said quietly.

"I figured." he told her and she looked up at him with a bit of surprise. "The bond was active when I met him the first time." he added. They both knew Alice had come in the picture after.

"I'm unmarked." she said, eyes back down and something like an old shame not fully gone in her tone. She didn't look ashamed though, and Eliot understood a bit of Margo and Quentin's admiration for that girl.

It took a second for Eliot to remember - family of magicians, likely all marked. There weren’t that many unmarked magicians, and old bullshit stigma was still stuck on them even today. Plenty of shit went around about the why they were unmarked and what it said about them. Eliot had always thought is was a load of bullshit.

"Oh." And he hadn’t expected Alice to be unmarked – so much for avoiding prejudice.

"I wanted to tell you. I don't expect..."

"Fine." Eliot sighed.

"What?"

"Fine. You and Q being whatever you two are. I’m not going to pretend I'm thrilled about it, or fully on board but I'm also very new at the whole relationship thing - in fact I'm probably going to be terrible at it regardless of us being soulmarked. Point is that out of all the people there is here I don't actually dislike you. Plus Margo likes you and Q does seem to have quite the crush so..."

"Margo _likes_ me?" Alice blurted out, voice slightly strangled and it was Eliot’s turn to raise eyebrows at her.

"Well, she certainly doesn't meow at just anyone."

 

#

 

Eliot crafted the paper airplane carefully.

He didn’t care about the looks Alice and Margo were giving him from time to time, worry clear in their eyes. The bond was still strong, pulsating softly even with worlds in between them. He enchanted the plane, so it would look for Quentin. It didn’t matter if none of the other believed Quentin could find a way to Fillory, Eliot couldn’t shake the feeling that he would.

Penny, strangely enough, was the only one not to seem surprised when Quentin and the hedgebitch appeared.

 

#

 

It would figure somehow that it was her, Quentin’s other soulmark. And if he was able to read Alice as reasonably well as he thought he did, she already knew about it. Eliot was sure Quentin wouldn’t like it, but he couldn’t help being angry with her. She had almost destroyed the mind of her own soulmate, what kind of person did that? And yet, she acted like she had more reasons to be at Quentin’s side than any of them.

Quentin looked at her with without resentment though, caring and with an underlying worry in his eyes, weirdly protective every time Eliot or Margo would make a side comment. Eliot tried not being foolishly hurt by it.

 

#

 

“Your majesty.” The smith had said with a bow when the blood appeared on Eliot’s hand. And fuck it had been a lot more painful than it looked on TV. He wasn't drunk enough for this.

“We will have to proceeded with the wedding in order to complete the bargain as intended. Much is to be done for the ceremony.” The man told him later - Eliot felt beautifully detached from it all.

He heard Margo take a sharp breath next to him and winced.

“Oh.” He said. “Could I… talk with my friend?” he asked faintly.

“Of course.” The smith said, as if Eliot shouldn’t even have to ask – which was probably the case.

He would have gone to Quentin but Margo grabbed him first.

 

#

 

“You cannot do that.” Margo said.

She looked upset, and Eliot felt bad because he knew he was, partially at least responsible for that. Maybe more than “partially” in fact, but they did need to fulfill the bargain, and apparently he was the key. Go figure. Quentin wouldn’t stray away much from the hedge bitch that almost killed him, and that in itself was a blow. He knew it was her words on Quentin’s ribs, and hated her even more for that.

“I can. I will.”

“Do you even understand how wedding works here? You won’t be able to have anyone else. Ever.”

He scoffed.

“Here, sure, but it’s not like…” he paused when he saw the look on Margo’s face. “Oh… I’m not going to be able to go back am I?”

Margo’s face was pretty telling.

“Not likely – at least never permanently. I mean there are probably some loopholes in this – there is always a loophole in everything but...”

“They cannot erase or block soulbonds.” Eliot said. “It’s not possible right?”

Margo laughed bitterly.

“Yeah, I don’t think soulbonds can be stopped, even here, with their weird magical wedding. You do realize that this is Quentin we are talking about? He is not really royalty material – even if he thinks he is. If we survive this mess, Quentin will probably move again, find other quests, we both know that. I’m not sure he would stay here forever, as much as he loves Fillory.”

Eliot could hear the “not for you” in her tone, even as she stopped herself from saying it. He shrugged, hoping to look more casual about it than he truly felt.

“I know.” He told her simply.

And he truly did.

 

#

 

“What kind of asshole would I be if I let you do that?” Quentin asked, and Eliot felt a smile on the corners of his lips.

“My kind of asshole.” He said, meaning every word.

Quentin laughed, but it sounded choked.

“I don’t want you to do this.”

“I already had this talk with Margo, Q and the answer is pretty much the same. We don’t really have a lot of options do we? Me being the only one acceptable as high king apparently.”

Quentin made a face at that and Eliot almost chuckled. Of course Quentin would be bitter about that. Not even a minute later Quentin looked guilty because that’s how he was - feeling guilty about feeling annoyed.

“You know that we’re probably all going to die even though you do this right?” Quentin said. “I kinda already died, like thirty nine time already. Jules too. Not too sure about you but…”

“Pretty sure I’m dead too in those timelines.” Eliot interrupted. He couldn’t quite see a universe where he would be the one to survive and live on.

“Why I am even surprised you would be the High King of a place with opium in the air?” Quentin muttered, a tiny touch of humor in his voice.

“Well, you’re soulbonded to that High King darling.” Eliot said with a small smile. “That probably tells something about you too.”

There was almost a smile on Quentin’s lips as the dragged Eliot down for a kiss. Eliot hoped he didn’t seem as desperate as felt when he kissed him back. Q didn’t seem to know about the “exclusivity” close of Fillorian weddings yet and as much as Eliot currently hoped it wouldn’t apply to his soulmate, he wished to leave that detail in the dark as long as he could - forever being a nice option, if unrealistic.

And if this all ended with death number forty, Eliot was somehow ok with it.

 

#

 

Soulmarks it turned out were good for at least one thing.

People of Fillory, were extraordinarily respectful of soulmarks.

They also didn’t seem to have any themselves. Something to do with magic, and with magic in Fillory especially – Eliot didn’t really get it. But as soon as one of them accidentally noticed the soulmark on Eliot after an attempt at rudely cleaning himself they apologized profusely to Eliot for assuming the High King was free to wed on their terms. The smith kept talking to Eliot as if Quentin was already his consort, insisting on how it was not meant to belittle their soulbond with that wedding, and how they would settle for something more symbolic – or at least less absolute.

Eliot didn’t bother to tell them wrong. He also strongly suspected that the “accident” in which his soulbond was made apparent was Bambi’s work. Not that he complained but the list of things he owed her for kept on getting longer, as much as she would roll her eyes at him for this he tried to keep count. From what Eliot understood the wedding was still a go, but more symbolic and less “forever bound to a unknown girl he would have to make babies with for the rest of his natural life”.

The look of astonishment on Julia’s face when she understood whose soulbond they were talking about, before grabbing Quentin - to ask for some explanations no doubts - only made the whole thing better.

 

#

 

It only lasted a second but he felt like something was very, very wrong. Then it was gone, but the unease didn’t disappear, and wasn’t only due to his new pseudo wife and his apparent status of High King. He suddenly wished Quentin and Julia were back already, or that he had gone with them.

 

#

 

“Just so you know, I don’t like you.” Julia told him much later, managing to catch him alone and Eliot was about to tell her how mutual the feeling was when she continued. “I don’t like you and you don’t like me. But as it turns out, we’re both Q’s soulmates so I guess we will have to make due with what we have.”

There was something different about both Q and her ever since they had come back from their little meeting with Ember. He couldn’t put his finger on it, and hadn’t dared to question Quentin about it yet, but something was off. For a lack of better word, things seemed darker. Julia, now that he was looking at her, he realized she was pretty damn close to Margo in terms of putting on armor. Eliot had spent enough time around her to sense it, if not always see under it. Armor was full on. Whatever had gone down, it had been bad.

“As long as you don’t try to crush his mind into permanent nightmarish coma I’m sure I can’t quell the urge to fight it out.” He said, more spiteful than he intended. Apparently he wasn’t as over the inception thing as Quentin was.

Julia rolled her eyes. As fundamentally different as they were, something in the way she did it reminded Eliot of Quentin and he was suddenly painfully aware of how long those two’s bond had been active.

“Figures Q would go and get himself soulbonded to Fillory’s High King.” He heard her mutter as she walked out. Eliot laughed.

He wasn’t one for optimism, but maybe they would work something out this time.

 

#

 

“It’s not mine to tell.” Quentin told him later, nightfall strange yet comforting around them.

Eliot would deny that they were cuddling, if anyone was ever to ask, even if it was probably what it looked like, both of them curled over some beat up couch in a corner, his chin on Quentin’s shoulder. Penny was talking to Julia in another room – Eliot had no idea why – and he was pretty sure Margo had stolen Alice away somewhere. He was definitely going to have to ask about that at one point.

“Ok.” He said quietly. And it really was, because Eliot understood that, loyalty, and things that are not yours to tell. He loved that about Quentin too. He loved a lot of things about Quentin, he realized.

“Are you…” Eliot started before stopping himself. None of them were really ok. “Are we good?” he asked instead trying to will himself not to regret it immediately when Quentin didn’t respond right away.

“I don’t know.” Quentin told him honestly, fingers playing with Eliot’s hand on his stomach. “But I guess I would like it if we got to find out?”

Eliot could work with that.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have no idea how this thing happened in the first place but this is like the first fic I post in live over five years and the very first on this website. This show gave me the urge to write again...


	2. and I’m worried my wires are crossed again...

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The other side of the story from Quentin's side.

#

 

Quentin was born marked.

His parents didn’t know how to feel about it, neither of them having soulmarks themselves. They never really expected their child to have one. As time passed however, it sometimes made them feel better than someone out there would be connected to their child in a way that they wouldn't ever get close to managed.

 

#

 

Quentin never gave his soulmarks much thought. They were just _there_ , he couldn’t remember ever being without them so it never felt like a big deal the way it was for someone who had witnessed them appear.

Julia had always been much more into them than he ever was. She found the entire thing fascinating, wondering about the how and the why of them being possible in the first place, craving answers she couldn’t find. Both of them had more than one soulmark. It wasn’t that rare – people having two or three marks – but it wasn’t exactly common either.

They knew already that they had each other’s soulmark. Julia’s mark on Quentin was along his ribs, on his right side her handwriting clear. His mark on Julia was on her collarbone, slightly slanted. They had spoken each other’s words as kids, and felt the connection settle the first time they touched. Both of them felt the soulbond steady itself as they grew.

Finding each other had been like finding something he didn’t know he could have in the first place, yet suddenly feeling like it had been necessary. Quentin and Julia had been close to inseparable after that first meeting. Everything had seemed so easy then.

Everyone expected their relationship to become romantic – even Quentin expected it somehow – yet it never really happened. He had been confused about it in high school, like most people who knew about them carrying each other marks. He was pretty sure Julia was too. They felt plenty toward each other – Quentin was half in love with her for most of his high school years – but somehow it never really quite went past being half in love.

They did love each other but they weren’t fully in love with each other, not in the way people expected them to be. Some parts of Quentin almost resented Julia for that. It was hardly her fault – he knew that of course - but he wasn’t quite logical about it. At his worst, when his brain would just freeze and break for a while, he was even angry with her for doing ok. But never quite as angry as he was at himself though, especially when he stupidly felt betrayed when she started to date James in college.

James wasn’t Julia’s other soulmark - which was good, because even though Quentin grew to like him well enough, he was pretty sure he didn’t like him _that_ much. He had always hoped he would like Julia’s other soulmark. When they were kids, they had been so sure they would both like the other soulmark, because they would be important too, even if Quentin and Julia had found each other first. It seemed naïve now, that they thought they would have any control over it.

Neither of them had met their other soulmark, not in high school nor in college, and he knew Julia was starting to wonder. Some people never met their soulmarks, others just missed each other – Julia and Quentin had been lucky to find each other so soon, people kept telling them that. Quentin didn’t quite manage the stare that Julia had polished in the recent years to make people regret even opening their mouth in the first place, but he was certainly rolling his eyes at them in his mind more often than not. As if Julia and him were being greedy by hoping to meet the second one.

And yet, Quentin doubted more and more than it would work out for him. The words of his other soulmark were the epitome of pointless, as much as Julia wanted it not to be. It was only his name, with a question mark at the end, on the side of his neck, under his left ear, in an almost elegant handwriting. He hadn’t let his hair grew just to cover it, but he didn’t mind the side effect. Quentin had already heard those first words often enough, without ever feeling anything like a bond, but a part of him worried that maybe he’d missed it.

“No. You would have known if it was them.” Julia insisted. “You know you would have Q, the way we knew.”

“I didn’t touch all the people whose first words was my name Jules.”

“I knew even before we touched.” She said, and she sounded so sure. “I know our words weren’t as casual, but I _knew_ Q. And I’m sure you would too. You did back then.”

 

#

 

Quentin never knew how to explain to her that this was what he worried about.

That maybe his brain or the meds, or both, were fucking things up. The whole _feeling_ part of the soulmark bond, because yes he had known back then too, with Julia, but he barely remembered how that felt some days. He never found the courage to bring that subject on the table though. He kept on pretending he was doing ok, and Julia kept on acting like she believed him.

 

#

 

“Quentin Coldwater?” the guy asked, making a face as he said the words, as if the name was leaving a weird aftertaste in his mouth.

In any other circumstances, Quentin would have felt slightly insulted – though, ok, he could understand the reaction – but right now he didn’t feel anything past the strangest awe. Everything was humming with _something_ that he couldn’t pinpoint. He frantically hoped it wasn’t the meds, stuttering something that could have pass for agreement. The guy got down on the grass – and wow he was _tall_ – before giving him a long once over. Quentin was too stunned to bring himself to care about eventual bad first impressions. He hardly ever made good first impressions anyway.

Then, when he finally managed to put words together in a somewhat meaningful manner, he asked where he was. That seemed like the sane thing to do and Quentin really hoped he was still sane. The guy almost stopped in his track before answering casually. Quentin felt even more overwhelmed, buzzing with a new energy he hadn’t felt in years and the quiet hope than he wasn’t dreaming or hallucinating all this.

He followed Eliot around the place – that was his name, Eliot, he had to remember that. They reached a door Eliot opened before pushing Quentin inside what looked like and exam room.

“Late!” someone said loudly, and Quentin couldn’t quite process anything past the feel of Eliot’s hand pushing him toward a table with a chair still empty.

He walked toward the table, confused and sat down unable to quiet the throbbing in his mind.

 

#

 

Quentin felt a wave of relief when he saw Julia, hugging her tightly because it seemed so perfectly _right_ for her to be here too. _“She sees it too”_ , he told himself, _“this is really happening, it’s not just in your mind!”_ and it made things a little bit quieter in his head. Everything around him still felt like it was pulsing with a new energy, humming, shifting into something new but Julia was there, and he wasn’t dreaming. Magic was _real_.

There were asked curtly to both go where they were directed and they went their separate way, leaving Quentin unable not to feel like they should have had more time.

 

#

 

Something about walking around Brakebills with Eliot and Margo felt so utterly like belonging that Quentin was left almost breathless by it all.

 

#

 

After the disaster of that spell Alice had them cast went down without him getting expelled, Quentin almost thought that things were finally going to be better.

As it tuned out, he was once again very wrong.

Julia incepted the fuck out of him and as much as Quentin pretended to be at least semi ok afterward he truly wasn’t. Or he had been, for like five seconds right after waking up, Eliot’s hand on his head, touching him lightly. It all came crashing back seconds later and brandy couldn’t help with that. No one here knew what Julia was to him, about their soulmarks, and how deep this cut truly was. Quentin wanted to throw up, or cry, or both.

“She was a mess,” Kady told him, and it struck him as weird because why would Kady care? Still, she seemed sincere. He liked Kady. “She came to help fix it. She didn’t know how bad that spell could be. I’m not saying she isn’t a bitch, but she regretted it you know? I felt like you should know that much.”

It didn’t help much but he appreciated it nonetheless.

Quentin almost wished that he could hate Julia, while at the same time he really didn’t want to hate her. Couldn’t really even when he wanted to, even as angry as he was. He had been awful with her – they had both been awful to each other. He had left her behind, belittled her love for magic because he was angry with her for leaving it behind, for moving on, for managing in the world while he could barely keep himself afloat. He had being petty and condescending. Still, he couldn’t get over what she had done either, over the mental hospital, over what his subconscious had chose as his punishment. He felt so angry he didn’t know what to do about it.

“You’re both the spider and the web.” Jane had said. She had never been so right.

He put bandages over Julia’s mark that night, knowing it wouldn’t help, or heal it, just hiding the damage. Both Julia’s mark and the skin around were bruised – it didn’t take a genius to know why. He willed himself not to cry, unable to even try to go to sleep. The idea of sleeping again felt positively nauseating.

Quentin stared at the ceiling without seeing it for most of the night.

 

#

 

Julia’s mark stayed painful and the bruises refused to heal. Strangely enough, he didn’t feel as disturbed as he expected. Despite occasional white noise and the migraines, the comforting pulse of a bond was still there, allowing him to rest.

 

#

 

It took Quentin an embarrassingly long time to realize that what he was feeling, steady, warm and strong was another bond. And by “an embarrassingly long time” Quentin truly meant that it had taken some gruff magician from South Brakebills to more or less spell it out for him.

Truth was, he had been trying to forget. About Julia. About what happened, about their bond, about all the anger he carried with him. About his father, about his own flaws. Who left their soulmark behind, in pain and loss, the like he did? Assholes that was who. Then again, who would incept their soulmark to the point of potentially trapping them in a nightmarish world of their own making forever?

Maybe this all just proved how well he and Julia fitted together.

He should have realized, looking back on it, that the occasional white noise and migraines came from Julia, from their soulbond being hurt. He hadn’t even recognized the new soulbond happening, hadn’t even registered it, which was exactly what he had always feared.

“Two active soulbonds can make things harder with magic.” Mayakovsky said. “It is not only you that you carry within yourself you see – magic knows that. Neither of your soulbonds seem stable right now. ”

Quentin had no idea what face he made when he understood what Mayakovsky was talking about, but it had probably been a pretty desperate one because the magicians he had brought him in his office before ordering Quentin to show him both marks. He asked Quentin to take off the bandages as soon as he saw them.

“This is no good. Like a wound on both your souls. The bond is open still, not rejected, but it’s not right, leaking. Magic is attracted by it and repulsed by it, their energy and your energy is all screwed up. The other one on your neck is healthier, that’s why you didn’t feel the damaged one wholly, but it’s a young bond, still unsettled, can’t make up for this mess entirely.”

“You make it sound like soulmarks and magic are a linked thing.” Quentin said weakly. "Like magic is a living thing."

Mayakovsky laughed, but it sounded bitter. “Of course magic is a living thing. It even has it’s own will sometimes, regardless of how much we like to pretend we control it. Soulmarks are a part of that too, whether magicians realize it or not. You being a magician can affect your soulbonds, your soulbonds in turn can affect your magic, and you being a magician. This is not something you get to choose.”

Quentin scowled.

“Why do magicians even have those at all, the soulmarks, if they only fuck up our magic?”

The man gave him a long look.

“Not all of them have them. The soulmarks are what they are. They can make your magic weaker and they make it stronger. The bonds are always double-edged swords – like magic itself. It can make you less as much as it can make more than you ever could be your own. You’re the only ones who can choose which way it will be for you.”

 

#

 

It was pathetically easy to figure it out after that.

It barely took minutes for Quentin to get it.

Eliot.

Of course it was Eliot. Quentin couldn’t believe he’d miss it in the first place - except he could, because there had been so much that day, Fillory book six, Brakebills and _magic_ – of course he had missed it. Exactly how he always thought he would. Julia would have been so mad – or laughed at him - he wasn’t sure anymore.

Quentin was so fucked.

 

#

 

He wondered if the bond was to blame for the low-key crush he had on Eliot probably since day one, but it felt like an easy excuse. He replayed their first meeting again and again, vaguely embarrassed by the mess of first words Eliot must have been carrying somewhere on his body. He wondered how Eliot could have been so calm about it or how much of it had been just rolling with it because he didn’t know what else could to do. Wondered how disappointing it must have been to get Quentin as his soulmark.

Quentin had never given much thought to his second mark - had probably unconsciously already given up on ever meeting whoever he was bonded to.

He hadn't expected Eliot.

 

#

 

Then there was Alice, and the foxes, and this was probably one more way the universe fucked with them a little bit more for the Hell of it. Margo had been so right about that.

 

#

 

Alice kept avoiding him – which was understandable as much as Quentin wished she wouldn’t. He liked her, genuinely liked her and for the first time he thought he understood how Julia felt when she had to explain over and over again why she was in a relationship with James despite him being unmarked. Alice was unmarked too, like James – except she was the only one in her family. She had told him during the trials – he had in turn sort of told her about Julia – and it had never seemed like a big deal to Quentin before he met her, to be unmarked.

But magicians more often than not carried soulmarks on their skin. He knew that now, yet hadn’t realized how things were for Magicians with no marks, especially in a family full of marked magicians.

She’d seen his marks, obviously, but she hadn’t asked about them, and Quentin hadn’t offered any explanations either. It hadn’t seemed important back in Brakebills South.

It seemed pretty damn important now.

 

#

 

Quentin wanted to talk to Eliot as soon as they were back.

Except he also wanted to find a way to fix things with Alice and Eliot had this guy with him – Matt or something. It was making it impossible for Quentin to just go to Eliot and say something like _“I think I have your mark and hopefully you have mine too because Mayakovsky never mentioned that it was one-sided and could we please talk about it?”_ despite the fact that part of him really wanted to just go and do that.

 

#

 

Looking back on it, Quentin felt like he should have just gone for it. It couldn’t have turned out worse than what had happened. Penny was saved by the skin of his teeth, Eliza was very dead and so was Mike. Saying Eliot was a mess was being overly nice. Quentin wasn’t feeling particularly nice.

“You should probably try something.” Alice told him.

Things weren’t perfect between them but he was glad they had managed to settle into whatever they were now. He wasn’t clear on what was supposed to be going on, but at least they managed to talk. That was a progress. He wished he could say as much about Eliot and him.

Of course Alice had figured out that the mark on his neck was Eliot’s, because she was brilliant and didn’t need someone to spell it out for her. Unlike Quentin.

“I don’t know what to do. I’m probably the last person that can help considering I’m kind of the reason his “maybe boyfriend except maybe not there yet or whatever” is dead now.”

“You’re also the one with his mark on your skin Q. It’s unlikely that not even acknowledging that is helping either of you right now.”

“I know that!” and he truly did truly. But every time he would try to just go for it, he couldn’t help finding reasons not to go through with it. Eliot being either too drunk or too high – or a combination of both – didn’t help boost his confidence.

Quentin wished he could talk to Julia more than ever now. Her mark didn’t hurt as much as it did before, slowly healing, but things were still a far cry from what they used to be between them. He knew they weren’t ok yet – they would be in the future, he knew that, just not yet. Still, the urge to call and just say, _“I found my other soulmark Jules! Except that guess what? I missed it completely when it happened and now I don’t know what to do and I wish we could talk about it.”_

“I don’t mind you know.” Alice tried, tone gentle if a bit stiff.

“Great.” Quentin said without meaning it because he still had no idea how he felt about any of it, his emotions blurry, confused and weirdly separated from himself.

“I’m not trying to say it’s easy – I know it’s not – my family… believe me I _know_. It’s just that I… I think it could be ok you know. If you two talked.”

Quentin looked away. He couldn't process all that right now.

"I don't think either of us is really good at talking."

 

#

 

Neither Alice nor he talked about Christopher Plover’s house. (Making out and cuddling felt easier.)

 

#

 

Penny went and disappeared with the button, ignoring Quentin’s warning like the arrogant dumbass he enjoyed being. As much as Quentin wished he wasn’t worried he absolutely was.

 

#

 

He couldn’t understand why someone like Eliot was bound to him, just like he never understood how Julia ended up with him as one of her soulmarks either. It seemed unfair to both of them – they were both brilliant and Quentin was just… just what he was. Then again, as Eliot liked to remind them, nothing in life was fair, and soulmarks probably weren’t an exception.

 

#

 

Penny always seemed to find Quentin’s mind.

As annoying as Quentin kept saying he found him, he was relieved when Penny finally appeared in his dream. He was pretty damn glad Penny wasn’t dead.

He didn’t know why Penny seemed to have Quentin’s mind as some kind of weird lighthouse to go to, but he was sort of cool with it now. After all, Penny had taken a magical blade meant for Quentin - it put their whole "being assholes to each other" into perspective. Penny seemed pretty resigned with ending up in Quentin's mind more often than not, despite how much he complained about, well, everything about Quentin.

So, maybe they even liked each other. A bit.

Not that it made Penny any less of an asshole as soon as he was back with them in Brakebills, but Quentin never expected anything less.

 

#

 

“She is doing good.” Kady told him in private, hand around her left wrist, while the other were busy with the material she had giving them for the battle magic timesaver. “We’re… she’s great even, we’re working on something that could be amazing. The mark is healing well.”

For some reasons, Quentin wasn’t surprised she knew, not that he was comfortable talking about it with her. Judgment free zone he guess, or something close enough. He wanted to ask her why she had disappeared – he never believed for one moment that she didn’t care.

“I know.” He told her, without mentioning that his was healing well too. He figured she probably knew.

“I still think it’s a shitty idea – the battle magic thing. What I’m giving you guys, it’s a shortcut, a tricky one. Magic doesn’t like shortcut. It will probably feel like crap for all of you – the few people I saw use that were messes afterwards.”

“We don’t really have a long list of options.”

“You’re sure you don’t wanna wait for Julia? If you don’t want to tell me what’s going on, maybe you should at least tell her.”

“Would you want to talk to Penny right now?” he asked her, not meanly just pointedly enough.

She winced, and understandably let it go.

 

#

 

Bottling emotions was all fun and games until you had to swallow back everything in one shot leaving you like an exposed nerve, everything naked to the core, overwhelmed with the urge to claw out of your own skin and mind.

 

#

 

Quentin felt like a muddled mix of contrary emotions. He felt alternately raw, bruised, exhausted, sad, angry yet warm, relaxed and utterly careless. And he had to kiss Eliot. He had to because he had been wondering how it would feel to be kissing Eliot even before he knew they were soulmarked, tiny thoughts, easy to dismiss. The boys kissing Eliot always looked so pleased…

So Quentin did, put his hands on Eliot's vest vaguely annoyed at having to be on his tiptoes to reach, clumsily putting his lips on Eliot's in a quite pathetic approximation of a kiss. Miraculously enough, Eliot kissed him back.

Quentin realized afterward that the hands holding his face had been shaking.

 

#

 

He woke with Eliot's arm around his hips and didn’t avoid the utterly cliché straight guy freak-out. He tried to calm himself down for a bit but it caught up with him in the end and he ran out of the room like a coward while Eliot slept.

 

#

 

Alice took one look at him and frowned so obviously his poker face? Not a good one.

“Q? Are you okay?”

He mumbled something that was probably trying to mean yes but likely didn’t quite sound like yes at all because Alice frowned deepened.

"What happened?"

"Nothing?" he squeaked before mentally slapping himself because it sounded like a question.

Alice paused, giving him a long hard look.

"Did you... did something happened with Eliot?"

"Why would anything happen?" he tried and was amazed at how unbelievable he sounded to his own ears.

Which is why he wasn't surprised Alice made an educated guess that turned to be out rather spot-on.

"Did you sleep with Eliot then freaked out and left?" she asked. She was pulled together, though more tense than usual. He knew she said she was ok with it - whatever it was supposed to be - but neither of them really was all that confortable with, well _it_ just yet.

"Could we not talk about it? At least not right now if never isn’t an option?"

Alice looked like she was going to protest before stopping herself and shaking her head softly. Quentin was pretty sure she was relieved to avoid that talk for a bit longer too. She tapped the couch next to her and he sat down before putting his head in his hands. The feeling of having fucked up kept growing more potent.

“I just hope you realize,” Alice finally said with an apologetic glance in his direction that he caught from the corner of his eyes, “that Margo is going hunt you down.”

Quentin froze before swearing profusely.

 

#

 

“Quentin, did you have sex with Eliot before running out in the morning like a gutless scaredy cat with your tail between your legs?” Margo venomously attacked with when she managed to catch him.

He knew he wouldn’t avoid her for long, but he had been hoping for longer than that. Quentin had never wished for invisibility as much as he wished for it right now – not even when the Beast had appeared from the mirror. From her terrifyingly false sweet tone alone he knew he was as good as a dead man on a suspended sentence.

“I… uh, well…” he tried, wanting to deny the whine in his voice. “I mean it does sound like a major asshole move when you say it like that.”

He was actively trying to avoid her eyes, but she didn’t let him, grabbing his chin and turning his face toward hers.

"You better fix this Quentin" she said soberly, cold quiet ire in her eyes still, "or soulmark be damned I will make you regret it."

Quentin knew better than to think she was kidding about that.

 

#

 

“You really gotta get your shit together.” Penny told him sternly, which somehow was really not what Quentin expected out of his mouth. He guess he expected something along the lines of _“could you please stop your dick from making us waste precious time by making things super awkward for everyone”_ but then, Penny decided to surprise him.

“What?” he mumbled intelligently and Penny’s eyes rose to the sky clearly hoping for a divine intervention. Or he was just being an asshole, whatever, Quentin didn’t know anymore at this point. Mostly he just tried to roll with Penny being Penny.

“You have this thing, where you see yourself a certain way, and then act like an ass when you get that you’re not the way you thought you were.”

Quentin frowned, genuinely confused, and this time Penny just looked annoyed.

“For fuck sakes,” he groaned, “you’re not straight, and before you freak about it no you’re not gay either. I get it, it’s blowing your mind but now could you please try getting over it faster and fix this mess so we could maybe have a fighting chance to survive while you and Eliot aren’t falling apart miserably?”

“Oh my god,” Quentin whispered faintly, “this is not happening. We are not having this conversation.”

Penny snorted.

“Believe me, I _really_ wish we weren’t.”

 

#

 

After the surreal chat with Penny, Quentin knew he had to do something. If he didn’t, well Margo had been quite clear on how much she could (and would) make his life even more painfully shitty than it already was and Penny would probably try to team up with Alice for the next intervention, which Quentin was pretty sure he never wanted to see happen.

So he grabbed as much courage as he could find in himself and went to talk to Eliot.

 

#

 

They did manage to talk, eventually, just not before Eliot pushed him back on the bed after Quentin’s first sad attempt at an apology. Emotions washed over too fast on Eliot’s face for him to grasp, only getting something fierce and a little bit wild right before getting dragged in a harsh kiss. And yeah, ok, Quentin would admit that Penny had a valid point: he probably wasn’t as straight as he thought he was. From the nearly automatic reaction he had from Eliot’s hand on the back of his neck and the feel of his mouth against his own, he clearly wasn’t straight at all.

Everything was sharper this time, less clouded, more intense. “You want out it’s right now Q.” Eliot breathed against his mouth and something like panic started beating in his chest but he kissed Eliot back, because doing anything else was unthinkable. They crashed against each other, and Quentin was sure he felt things _move_ around them. He felt the bed itself stir, the buttons of his pants flew away, Eliot making a pleased noise in the back of his throat and oh. _Telekinesis_ , Quentin realized with a jolt, getting from half hard to rock hard so fast it left him dizzy, the grin appearing on Eliot’s face telling him he hadn’t missed the reaction and was going to milk it for all it was worth. And so he did, getting both of them naked and pining Quentin to the bed without even touching him.

Quentin would have been embarrassed about coming so fast if somehow his refractory period wasn’t surprisingly short. Eliot, delighted, took it as a challenge, making him come twice before getting him hard a third time, despite Quentin telling him it wasn’t gonna happen just by slowly working him open. Eliot was deliberately smug when he proved him wrong, but Quentin was too busy losing his mind to call him out on it.

Eliot’s arm swiftly snaked behind his shoulders, hand moving from his neck to the back of his head, long fingers tightening in the mess of his hair before pulling until Quentin’s head went back in the exact way he wished for, the arch of his throat on display. It wasn’t exactly a surprise but more like a revelation when Eliot’s mouth went down on Quentin’s soulmark biting hard enough on his neck to draw some blood. Quentin came so hard he blacked out a little, barely feeling Eliot coming a few second later, moaning words Quentin couldn’t understand against his neck.

 

#

 

Eliot was, Quentin noticed quickly enough, quite obsessed with his mark on Quentin’s neck. It was like now that Eliot knew he could, he had to keep touching it – a lot. A warm hand sneaking around Quentin’s neck and fingers brushing against the mark was becoming something of a recurring occurrence. When Eliot didn’t just grab him to put his mouth on it somewhere more private.

Quentin was glad Eliot understood his aversion for public display of affection – or whatever they could call Eliot’s thing for marking his neck. He knew well enough that Eliot didn’t have the same reservations but, for a lack of better world, Eliot was _careful_ with him. He also couldn’t seem to get his fill and Quentin discovered that he had a bit of a thing for Eliot’s eagerness. There was something really hot for Quentin in that - in seeing how much Eliot was into it. He loved it when Eliot lost control. Not that he would admit it, and he was pretty sure Eliot had thankfully no idea but it joined his list of fantasies with other more or less admissible ones, to get Eliot to lose himself completely at least once.

 

#

 

Seeing Julia again was like coming back to your childhood home after a long time away.

As terrible as things were, it felt right to hug her again. Something felt slightly off in their healed bond, but it was like a distant bell ringing, far away from the more pressing matters. In the back of his mind, Quentin thought that the whole god curing cancer thing seemed too good to be true, especially after Quentin’s own dabble on that side, but he couldn’t focus on that. Not with Alice, Eliot, Margo and Penny in Fillory, potentially in danger. Hopefully they were all fine.

Julia and Quentin just had to find their way into Fillory, together, like they always said they would.

 

#

 

As it turned out, what seemed so amusing and quirky about people of Fillory in the books was more along the lines of vaguely weird to full-on disturbing once you were _in_ Fillory.

On that note, Quentin and Julia perhaps shouldn’t be allowed to make bargains – ever - because now they could have the weapon sure, but someone had to get married first. And then become High King of Fillory. Which, let’s face it, Quentin would be absolutely thrilled to be the chosen one, in fact it probably had to be him right? Tomato and everything? Except it also meant getting married to the smith girl – who of course had as much of a say in this as, well, the rest of them – so yeah, arranged marriage were totally a thing for magical bargains! Exactly what they all needed!

And of course, because the universe never was done fucking them over, Quentin wasn’t the High King at all, but Eliot totally was.

“Get the fuck out.” He heard Margo mutter and yeah, that pretty much summed it up.

 

#

 

Quentin couldn’t let Eliot do that.

And ok, he may have been ready to do exactly the same if maybe Fillory had wisely decided to pick him rather than _Eliot_ but then again he had always been ready to live and die for Fillory so what was a wedding next to that? But Eliot wasn’t like him and if Quentin was honest, the idea of Eliot marrying a woman was somewhat aberrant to him.

Of course, Eliot would choose now to be noble, precisely when Quentin wanted him to be selfish. He said so, and Eliot laughed.

“I’m not being noble Q.” the look on Quentin’s face must have been telling because Eliot corrected himself. “Well ok, maybe I am being a bit noble – what can I say, you’re a terrible influence – but this isn’t all there is. I mean, I’m not overly thrilled about getting married but, oh well, High King of Fillory sounds like something that I could maybe pull off.”

“Eliot…”

“And we both know I wasn’t doing so good on Earth – not like I’ve been hiding that all that well recently and well… there is you, of course but maybe there could be this too?”

He sounded serious, not drunk or hazy the way he did sometimes. Quentin thought that maybe, maybe Fillory and its Gods weren’t as wrong as he wanted them to be when they picked Eliot.

 

#

 

By a lucky twist of Fate – that was actually Margo and Alice finally teaming up and cross checking what they both knew about Fillory’s ways while probably cornering every person they could find until they told them every little detail about royal wedding laws – it turned out that soulmarks were a pretty big deal in Fillory.

And by “pretty big deal” Quentin meant that he apparently kind of made it to King status just on the basis of being Eliot’s soulmate alone. Eliot was mostly of the hook for the whole “cannot ever be with anyone else ever” detail that Margo informed him the wedding initially implied. Which Eliot had incidentally forgotten to mention when Quentin had tried to stop him from getting married in the first place.

He would have a few words about that later.

 

#

 

“ _He_ is your other soulmark? The one whose mark is on your neck? That tall Brakebills asshole?” was the first thing out of Julia’s mouth as soon as they both were sufficiently away from the assembly around Eliot.

“Uh.” Quentin said realizing that he had completely forgotten to tell her about Eliot, about finding his other soulmark. “Yes?”

Julia paused, looking back and forth between Eliot and Quentin.

“Are you… angry with me?” he asked because he wasn’t sure even though he knew how to read her. She didn’t look angry, upset maybe, as if something else was bothering her, not only Eliot being his other soulmark. Jane’s warning in the back of his head had the bearings of a bad omen.

Julia looked surprised.

“Where you planning on telling me?” she replied.

“What? Of course I was! I wanted to call you so many times when I realized but things were all kinds of bad between us and then everything just started to happen and… I had no idea what I was doing Jules. I guess I forgot – or it was never the right time. But I was always going to tell you.”

She nodded. “I know. That’s why I’m not angry.”

“Oh… You’re ok with it then?”

“Well, I won’t tell you I’m elated about it. Can’t say he left the best impression the few times I saw him – unless the impression he was aiming for was “condescending arrogant asshole” in which case it was a full success I’ve got to say.”

“Uh…”

“Don’t worry Q, I’m pretty sure he has just as many nice things to say about me.”

And Quentin was sure she was right about that, he just wish she wasn’t.

“Also, if you think I didn’t saw you kiss him earlier, you’re dead wrong Q.” she said with a smile Quentin was too familiar with, “I just thought I could cut you some slack for now.”

She was never going to let him live that one down.

 

#

 

The thought briefly crossed his mind that there was something going on between Alice and Margo.

 

#

 

He couldn’t explain the terror, the rage, and the sensation of drowning that took over him when the bind over Julia’s memories was broken. It was as overwhelming as swallowing his own depression back had been - probably even worse, and Quentin barely stopped himself from throwing up.

Thankfully it all stopped quickly enough, and he knew that Julia, fucking brilliant Julia, had managed to stop it from completely bleeding to him thought their bond, even in her distressed state. He didn’t know what had happened to her but at the same time he felt like he knew too much. He felt sick, the bond between them solid, throbbing painfully still, artificially neutral. He had never wanted to punch a god as much as he wanted to punch Ember right now.

“Jules…” he tried, not knowing what to say.

“Don’t.” she said hoarsely. “I can’t. Not right now.”

He didn’t try to ask again.

 

#

 

Later, she told him and he wished he could kill that fox god already, long before she asked him to.

“At least,” he heard Julia whispered, not sure if she was still talking to him or to herself, “at least I saved her. At least she managed to run.”

He watched her hand clench against her thigh, where he knew her other soulmark was. He stayed silent before slowly taking her other hand in his and holding on tight.

 

#

 

“I found her you know,” She said, her head on his shoulder, “the one on my thigh.”

“I guessed.” He told her, surprised to realize as he was saying it that yes, he had a good idea who it was.

“She is so much cooler than yours.” And she wasn’t even close to smiling, but Q was glad she could still manage to taunt him a little about Eliot.

“Mine just became High King of Fillory.”

“He was taking shots with a bulldog and drunk out of his mind not too long ago.”

Quentin laughed faintly against her hair.

 

#

 

“I’m glad you have them.” Julia said softly. “I’m even glad you have him.”

“I have you too.” Quentin replied, because it felt like the only answer.

Julia didn’t quite smile, but she looked like she wanted to, maybe it was close enough. There was something hard on her face that he understood but also feared. He wished badly that Jane had given him more, wished he knew how to protect her, knowing he had already failed.

“You do.” She nodded. “And I got you too.”

Quentin held on tight. Hopefully this time they would make it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Soulmarks in this fic:
> 
> Eliot: Q’s mark circling around his elbow and arm like a snake, the exact words are “Uh uh… Okay, uh, hey – where am I?”  
> Quentin: side/back of the neck under his ear for Eliot’s mark & ribs for Julia’s mark  
> Alice: unmarked  
> Julia: left side of her collarbone for Q’s mark & around her left thigh for Kady’s mark  
> Penny: inner part of his right knee for Q’s mark & left shoulder for Kady’s mark  
> Kady: left wrist for Julia’s mark & left ankle for Penny’s mark  
> Margo: Alice’s mark under her left breast


End file.
